The Treasure Hunter

Today’s post, about the move to open large numbers of community schools in Philadelphia was written by Julia Terruso and published in “Philly.Com.” It is the most positive report of any city’s actions for its public schools that I’ve read in years.  Up until now the city and the state have under-funded  the city’s schools and been blind  to their physical decay and educational decline.  Out of desperation many parents have chosen charter schools or private schools for their children.  Now, with a new mayor in charge, there is imagination, action, and hope.  The only thing I can add to the situation is that Philadelphians should buy more sugary drinks.

Mayor Kenney’s administration will select from five to seven schools this summer to become community schools, with the city and private sector providing health, social, emotional, and after-school services.

Kenney wants to establish 25 such schools citywide in the next four years. They would be funded with $40 million, paid for by Kenney’s proposed sugary-drinks tax as well as contributions from nonprofits and the business community.

Schools would not be selected until after City Council approves a budget by June 30, said Susan Gobreski, Kenney’s director for community schools.

“I’m very confident we’re going to be looking at a developing community-schools program in the fall,” Gobreski said in a briefing about the plan with reporters Monday. She said the mayor’s full agenda – which includes pre-K and rec center upgrades in addition to community schools – will benefit every child in the city, and “I think there’s a lot of support for it.”

Starting this month, Kenney’s staff will meet with community members, service providers, and the School District to determine what criteria should go into picking the first schools – all traditional public schools, not charters.

Gobreski said in coming years the city might consider charter schools.

By September, each of the selected schools will have a full-time coordinator, paid by the city, to help beef up services and bring in partners.

Gobreski said the city is still developing its parameters, but will look for schools in high-poverty areas with principals willing to make changes. Both high schools and elementary schools will be considered.

So far, 43 of the district’s approximately 200 schools have expressed interest in the plan, said Karen Lynch, chief of student support services at the district.

Lynch noted some schools already have strong partnerships with the community and with the city. Currently, 100 schools have therapeutic services.

A formal application process will be announced in late spring or early summer.

Holly Gonzalez, the city’s deputy community schools director, outlined myriad programs she has seen implemented in community schools in other cities.

Some schools have dental and asthma screenings and immunization support, she said. Others partner with the Department of Recreation or Police Athletic Leagues to implement physical activities. “There’s a lot around wellness,” Gonzalez said. “Muffins with Mom, doughnuts with Dad, group yoga, all fused into the school day to create a more caring environment.”

Gonzalez has also seen programs where retirees are put into schools to help with literacy initiatives, and partnerships with universities to provide tutors or club mentors.

Council President Darrell L. Clarke and the teachers union have already voiced approval for the initiative, which has seen some success in cities like Cincinnati.

Gobreski said this is the right time for the initiative.

“The politics of disruption have not worked,” she said. “We’ve spent a lot of time and money trying to figure out how to avoid spending a lot of time and money to actually meet the needs of children.”

If you are wondering why I am posting so many essays that I wrote in the past, it’s because I’m not finding much good news about today’s education.  If  readers are aware of good things happening in schools in their area, they should let me know. They don’t have to write a full essay, only send me the basic facts.  Please help me and everyone else who cares about our public schools by sending me “good news” when you find it.

This intro leads me into explaining today’s post. It is an essay I wrote that appeared  in Education Week on-line in late August of 2015.  Because that was a busy time for teachers and parents, I don’t think it got much attention.

In the classrooms I have visited recently, there has been a lack of attention to the everyday uses of reading, writing, and speaking that could motivate students to work long and hard on assignments. What I see are mostly formal exercises in text analysis, vocabulary development, and essay structure that have no relation to young people’s interests or their need to communicate with people besides the teacher. I believe that, in addition to preparing students for “college and the workplace,” schools should provide classroom activities that focus students on their role as active participants in the world outside of school and prepare them to become informed and caring citizens.

To better serve students, teachers need to explore a variety of ways to develop their skills and increase their knowledge. One such move would be to bring newspapers back into the classroom and include them in the array of materials used to teach important information and skills. Newspapers can be a strong motivator for students to connect with the world today. Not only could they email friends and family members alerting them to important news stories, they could also write articles about the news for the school newspaper, or letters to the editor of the original newspaper.

Although most schools cannot afford a copy of a newspaper for each student in these tight-budget times, they could buy digital subscriptions for teachers. Or, better yet, digital subscriptions to two different newspapers, so that students could compare their coverage of the same topic. As long as copyright laws are followed, a teacher may make a printed copy for each student. If enough computers are available in a classroom, students can also read articles in other news sources regularly or search  a newspaper’s archives to find a window into history.

What should a teacher focus on? Much depends on the grade level, but why not start with articles on topics of local concern, such as the need for road and bridge repair, the low wages of fast-food workers, or the lagging graduation rates in our public schools? Any of those topics might stir a lively class discussion and move students to write letters to state politicians, their own school board, or the editor of the local newspaper. Some students might even produce op-eds and submit them to the newspaper for publication.

Still, there is much more than news in a newspaper that would be of value to students of different ages, abilities, and interests: advice about driving, health, fashion, movies, or sports; weather reports, political cartoons, and even word and number puzzles. Teachers might also find math problems worth working on in articles about family incomes, water shortages, temperature changes, or voting trends.

Personally, my favorite part of the newspaper has long been the daily comics. Although some comic strips are still written for children, most are clearly aimed at mature readers. I find political commentary, wordplay, and observations of human behavior in the comics that help me look at the world through a clearer lens—or laugh at myself. I also see sophisticated vocabulary that would benefit many students.

In addition, as a longtime newspaper addict, I’ve become a more discriminating reader. I use headlines and introductory paragraphs to decide whether or not I want to spend my time reading a complete article. I also tend to skim pieces of minor interest, but I read closely when something promises to better inform me, confirm my biases, or incite my anger. As a result of my reading, I often wind up writing a letter to the editor or supporting a worthwhile cause. Shouldn’t students also learn to make the same kinds of decisions and take similar actions?

With the Common Core State Standards’ strong emphasis on a balance of nonfiction and fiction texts, close reading, analytical and critical writing, and text comparisons, schools have been driven to use many materials that have little appeal to students of any age and few connections to their lives or real-world issues. By bringing newspapers into the mix of classroom materials, schools could move students closer to meeting the language arts standards while enhancing their personal interest in reading, writing, critical thinking, and meaningful action.

Today I am posting the second part of my argument about retention with a true story that I was involved in when I was a principal in rural Oregon. I assure you that I have not distorted the  facts in any way.  However, I must explain that we were a small school district with only two schools.  Our teachers and I knew each other and most students very well.  And, as the sole administrator for both schools I had the power and the funds to make adjustments in students’ programs without asking permission from our School Board.

In the schools where I am principal the decision to retain children in the curret grade is made by the Teacher Assistance Team (TAT). But in Tommy’s case, the TAT could not make a decision.

Tommy came to us in mid-year as a 5th grader from a city school where he had been in a self-contained class for emotionally disturbed children. Previously, he had spent four years at a residential treatment center where he both lived and went to school. When his mother regained custody and Tommy was allowed to live at home, she wanted him in a regular classroom in a public school. We had one week to get ready before Tommy’s arrival.

After reading Tommy’s thick file, we were all frightened. Especially concerned was his new classroom teacher, who already had 27 kids, some with their own problems. But we made a plan, hired an aide, cleared a storeroom as a “quiet place,” for Tommy when he got out of hand and waited for him to make his entrance.

Tommy was never as bad as advertised. He was a smart kid who may have realized that here was a chance at normalcy that hadn’t been offered to him before and was not likely to come again. Sure, his attention wandered—along with his feet—in the classroom, and he did get into some arguments on the playground, but after a few weeks we realized that he did not need the aide or the “quiet place.” Academically, Tommy made progress. By the end of the school year, he was almost up to grade level in reading and language arts and about a year behind in math. Should we promote him?

Actually, the question never hinged on academics. Our curriculum, teaching methods, and classroom structures were flexible enough to accommodate students with deficiencies far more serious than Tommy’s. The TAT was concerned about whether Tommy’s level of social and emotional maturity would allow him to make a satisfactory adjustment to the demands of middle school.

In the middle school building he would have to get himself from room to room on time, adapt to the personalities and styles of several different teachers, go without morning and afternoon recesses, and be in charge of his own assignments. Although he had formed a strong bond with his 5th grade teacher, he was not close close to his classmates. His playground companions were two and three years younger than he, and they would be staying behind at the elementary school. Wouldn’t it be better for Tommy to spend another year in an environment that had proved beneficial for him? Maybe.

On the other side of the coin was the fact that using the definitions provided by state and federal laws for the education of handicapped children, we could provide an “appropriate education” in the “least restrictive environment” by sending him on to middle school. Tommy would be academically grouped with other regular students in his grade. An aide would be available to help him get to classes on time and to get his assignments straight. Teachers were willing to modify their expectations and methods to suit his needs.

After talking through all the arguments, the TAT and the Middle School Council were still undecided. It was not just a matter of divided opinion; individuals in both groups leaned one way, then the other, and then back again. Finally, we decided that the critical issue was Tommy’s view of what was happening. With a child who had already been so battered by circumstances, would retention be seen as the ultimate blow, just another minor setback, a welcome opportunity to stay in a safe place, or a non-event? To find out, we set a conference for Tommy and his family with the school counselor who had been working with him and had gained his trust.

Surprisingly, the conference was a short one. As the counselor reported it to me afterward, mother and stepfather were sure what was best and got right to the point: Tommy should stay in 5th grade because he wasn’t ready for 6th. Both of them had been held back in grade school, and they believed it hadn’t done them any harm. Tommy was equally sure: he wanted to go on to middle school with “his” class.

The counselor pointed out to Tommy that he had had some problems in staying on task and getting along with other people. Tommy acknowledged that this was true, but he was ready to try harder. He did not argue with his mother or stepfather; he understood that the deal was between him and the school. The counselor did not argue either. Was there anything else that Tommy would like him to tell the principal before she made her decision? “Yes,” said Tommy, “Tell her `please’ and `thank you.’ ” End of conference. End of dilemma.

Tommy started 6th grade that September with support systems in place. He had a good year in both learning and social matters. In fact, his English teacher gave him the lead role in a school performance because he was self-confident and a good singer. Three years later he graduated from our middle school and went on to a high school in the neighhboring district. Unfortunately, we did not track his performance through those grades, but we did hear that he graduated on time.

Although I am aware of the emotional impact of this little drama—which is all true except for Tommy’s name—that is not why I tell it. Through Tommy’s story I hope to suggest the complex dimensions of all promotion/retention decisions and make clear that each child’s case deserves to be decided on its own merits. I also want to show that retention is not, as most adults believe, simply a matter of giving a slow learner more time to succeed or a recalcitrant one a taste of the real world. To a child, retention is an earthshaking event that shouts to him and everyone in his world that he is not an adequate human being. When a school chooses to retain a child, it should do so not only with fear and trembling, but also with a plan to make things better the second time around so that the terrible verdict it has rendered can be reversed.

Today and tomorrow I will post a two-parter on holding kids back.  The first one is an article I came accross a few days ago that was posted by Rush Walsh on his blogin 2014.  The second is my own account of what we did at our school in Oregon when the question of holding back a particular student came before us.

P.S.  Walsh’s essay refers to the work of David Berliner and Gene Glass, both of whom I admire.  If you live in the Portland area be aware that those researchers will be speaking on March 31 at 7 P.M. at Concordia University.  I will certainly attend, and you should, too.

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So what happens if students don’t score in the proficient or better range in the upcoming tests aligned with the Common Core? In many states, either by law or by policy, students will be retained in their current grade. Retention in third grade is the law in Florida and Arizona when children are not proficient in reading by the end of third grade. In New York City parents are told that “students with the lowest 10 percent of raw (total) scores on the State tests were recommended… for retention and summer school.  Many other states are considering such policies.

Retaining students in their grade, whether driven by standardized test scores, poor grades or misbehavior, has long been popular in American education. Even among teachers and administrators, retention is often seen as a way either well-meaningly to give a child “the gift of a year” to grow or more punitively as a way to threaten and cajole miscreants.

Retaining a child in a grade is a momentous decision in the life of that child and that family. Parents, full of hope and dreams for their child, may find their view of the child as a learner permanently altered. It very likely will negatively impact the way the child views himself or herself as a learner. Given the high stakes, educators better be sure they get the decision right when they decide to retain.

Does retention work? While there may be some anecdotal evidence that retention may work for some children some time, the overwhelming research evidence indicates that retention is bad for kids.

In their well-documented and very useful book, 50 Myths and Lies That Threaten America’s Public Schools, respected researchers David Berliner and Gene V. Glass, take on this issue. Here is what they have to say on the topic:

The decision to retain a student subsequently results in that student having more negative outcomes in all areas of academic achievement, and in social emotional areas of development such as peer relationships, self-esteem, and classroom behavior.

 Additionally, Berliner and Glass found that there is a greatly increased likelihood of retained students dropping out of school, being suspended and having high absenteeism. Not surprisingly, retention policies impact a disproportionate number of poor and minority children, further exacerbating the “achievement gap.”

So, if not retention, what? Social promotion, the promoting of students to the next grade even though they did not meet the standards of the previous grade, is widely derided by people in and out of the public education field, perhaps justly so. There is something about social promotion that smacks of educators abandoning their responsibility. Fortunately, this is not an either or situation. Instead of retention, what struggling students need is attention.

It costs, on average, about 11,000 dollars to retain a child (the cost of an extra year of school). By not retaining children, schools will save thousands of dollars in costs, not to mention all the human costs related to high drop-out rates and behavior issues related to retention. With this money schools need to give students the attention they need, in the form of programs that Berliner and Glass, among others, have found to be effective. Individual tutoring, summer programs and early intervention programs, such as Reading Recovery, have been shown to be effective ways to provide struggling students with the attention needed to “catch-up.” For high-poverty areas, the money could also be better spent on early childhood programs, wrap around health programs and smaller class sizes.

Retaining students is a shortcut answer to a problem that actually works against our goals as educators. Educators would do better to attend to their struggling students with programmatic changes than with this mean spirited “hold them back” approach.

Let us attend to our struggling students, not condemn them to the false promise of improvement through grade retention.

Today’s post was written by Don Bellairs, a regular reader and commentator of this blog.  I think he has some interesting and and practical ideas.  What do you think?

We aren’t doing a good job with our high schools.  We aren’t getting kids to come to school regularly. We aren’t getting all kids to graduate, and—when we do—many aren’t ready for college. We are trying to do too much and we need to dramatically cut down.

The act of improving education is an endless, Sisyphean task. We will always experience success and failure as we work to fulfill our constitutional obligation to provide free public education and to treat individuals as equals. But a crucial first step at this moment in our crisis is obvious: Think Occam’s razor. Think Thoreau’s “simplicity.”  Consider any of a thousand other examples in philosophy and common sense that admonish us to do less so that we may do better. American high schools today—different from one another in so many ways—share a common affliction: Like many of the pie-eyed, ambitious teens they serve, high schools try to do too many things at once. School employees—including teachers who have too much on their plates–choose to do first those things that are the most pressing. The unintended consequences are often neglect of the most needy students.

Relocating programs and activities that are not essential–not eliminating them—wouldn’t cost us a penny and would help us address the many problems we face in our public high schools. Certainly there are good arguments for continuing extracurricular programs that are ingrained in a school’s culture. But, if those programs are doing what they are supposed to be doing for high school kids, let’s make them part of the regular curriculum and available to all students. Technological advances and changes in our culture and in our understanding of learning processes now provide opportunities to modify a system of education that is not performing well, revealing opportunities not available until now. Our education systems would operate far more fairly and more efficiently—and more kids would complete our K-12 preparation programs with measurable skills— when schools do less and do it better.

We can gradually outsource the big-budget sports programs; Nike and Under Armour should pay for them anyway—they’re making all the money.  We would be amazed at how easily the Rotary Club can sponsor local sports teams, maintaining fields, hiring and supervising coaches—-they do it now for Little League.  Extracurriculars that serve a limited set of children should be incrementally reassigned to Parks and Recreation departments, churches, civic institutions, and private sector sponsors.

A school’s mission is further compromised by a flock of business people who descend on the upperclassmen with advertisements in many schools every September and don’t let up until June. I served as Activities Director at Oregon’s largest high school and was amazed by the marketing assault I experienced. We were charged ten grand to for them to decorate the cafeteria for a Friday night dance! Two grand for the DJ!  We had to charge $25 per person for attendance. That may not shock people but it should. Fortunately, I was able to change the process for our spring formal—we had in-house decorating done by the Drama Club and charged $10 admission. I came away with an awareness that, despite all the really good stuff we provide for high school kids,  too much of it wastes school money that could be better spent elsewhere.

What I suggest may be blasphemy to many in public education. Cutting football and band? No, not really cutting.  More like finding a new home. Granted, some of the best teachers I have worked with were coaches, drama teachers and band teachers. They were great teachers who did high-visibility work. Their ability to get children working together to achieve measurable goals is on public display so they have to be good. The problem for them: It is too easy to become exclusive when you are winning state championships…and those exclusive programs are what we should be trying to eliminate form public education.

For schools to enfranchise all students, we must learn to display the abilities of teachers who are able to get all kids to work well together, not just a select few. Concurrently, we must acknowledge that large the extra-curricular programs, regardless of how sacred and beloved, often serve an elite fraction of the school population. They operate outside mainstream supervision and often tend to outlive their usefulness after sucking up a lot of the school’s supply of oxygen…to the detriment of the greater good. School administrators I have known have spent too much energy on dance teams and ineligible football players. Youth football, big bands, even dance teams can and should exist, but we must find a way for them to operate outside the domain of the public school. Algebra teachers do not need to compete with jayvee coaches for kids’ attention or respect. They have a hard enough job already.

We can make choices when we design future schools. We can have a few students performing in expensive, state-of-the-art theaters or we can put a large number of kids on raised platforms in the front of every classroom and light them with clamp lights. When we  let both groups perform,  we will be nurturing exactly the same skills. We can re-enfranchise students by providing the same opportunities for everybody. Art classes, sports activities, drama and music do not have to go away—they can and should become integral parts of daily classes so that they serve all kids. Affluent parents who want their kids to participate on dance teams should enroll them in after-school programs instead. They should not expect other students watch the dance team perform at four consecutive assemblies. Those programs can be provided by other sources, without involving the taxpayers and public educators.

The system must evolve. We now know much more about the brain than in the past.  Our understanding of human development is far more profound. We have existing resources to change high schools to models of efficiency and equity without spending a lot of money. Ultimately, we can design functional, wide-open 24-hour sites for community schools that can be easily monitored and maintained. Then, professional journals that now discuss how to improve school statistics would instead be discussing how to make the experience more meaningful for all kids. As we redefine our high schools’ missions, we must glean what is most valuable from the many extracurricular activities that now exist and cast off what is elitist.